Trump and Musk to America: Drop Dead.

In 1975, President Gerald Ford rejected New York City’s request for a bailout, prompting the New York Daily News to publish its now-famous “FORD TO CITY: DROP DEAD” headline.

Fifty years later, President Donald Trump and his ambiguously-empowered henchman Elon Musk are doing far worse, and they’re directing their ire at the entire country.

Across the federal government on Friday, Musk’s misnamed “Department of Government Efficiency,” in conjunction with in-agency appointees, have decided to fire virtually all federal employees who they have decided can be fired.

Tens of thousands of “probationary” employees within their first year are being fired. There are anecdotal reports that employees promoted or moved within the past year and considered probationary are likewise being fired, in at least some agencies. The same is true, Law Dork has learned, of other, similar roles in some agencies, including term employees and reemployed annuitants.

These firings are in addition to contractors already told to stop work and employees who took the deferred resignation agreement, which, while varying widely across agencies, could reduce the number of active employees significantly further in some agencies.

The full effects are yet unknown, but they will be calamitous.

It started on Thursday night, when the Department of Veterans Affairs bragged about its cuts:

And though it first seemed to be individualized, it all was fitting with the pattern I described here at Law Dork on Wednesday: “[C]ontractors and probationary employees (those within their first year) are being fired.“

As STAT News detailed regarding public health, the cuts are dramatic:

From their report:

Senior officials were informed in meetings Friday morning that roughly 5,200 people on probationary employment — recent hires — across agencies including the National Institutes of Health and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention will be fired that afternoon, according to sources briefed on the meetings. CDC leadership was told the Atlanta-based agency would lose about 1,300 workers. The numbers at the NIH are not clear, but exceptions are being made for certain probationary employees, according to a memo viewed by STAT.

NPR later reported it was roughly 1,500 employees fired at NIH.

Talking Points Memo covered the National Cancer Institute firings:

NPR also covered the National Nuclear Security Administration firings:

The New York Times detailed cuts to the Environmental Protection Agency and Energy Department:

On Friday, officials at the E.P.A. said they had terminated 388 probationary employees. “President Trump was elected with a mandate to create a more effective and efficient federal government that serves all Americans, and we are doing just that,” Laura Gentile, an agency spokeswoman, said in a statement.

Some of the biggest cuts were made at the Energy Department, which began laying off staff members on Thursday, according to three people familiar with the matter. Around 1,000 federal workers at the agency, all probationary employees, were told they were losing their jobs, according to one of the people.

And yet, for all of that, the Times reported there are “an estimated 200,000 probationary workers“ across the federal government.

This is important because it means that every story written this week is just the tip of the iceberg. Each one is paired with dozens — hundreds, likely — that are not (yet) written.

As The Washington Post summed up the day’s consequences:

There will surely be follow-up litigation, at least as to some aspects of this, but this is not something — by and large — that is being stopped in advance.

It's happening, the fallout will be felt nationwide, and people are going to die because of it.